Yesterday, I wanted to book a Zipcar. Correction: I wanted to see how much booking a Zipcar costs. All I wanted to do was look at a map, see where the nearest car is, and learn how much it would cost to rent it for a day.
Unfortunately, the company made this simple demand impossible, and, after 20 minutes of trying to see what Uber shows me in 20 seconds, I gave up — and I won’t try again any time soon.
Here’s the kicker: I have been a Zipcar customer for about eight years. They managed to lose a customer they already, completely won over almost a decade ago in less than half an hour.
Here’s the story.
In my Zipcar settings, it says, “Member since Sep 3rd, 2012.”
During my semester abroad in US, we had a zipcar on campus. My fellow exchange students and I loved it. It was an on-demand rental you could book as available, and pay as you go.
We used Zipcar a lot. We bought furniture, we took weekend trips, we went shopping — some guys even moved dorms with it! All in all, we must’ve spent at least $2,000 on Zipcar between the eight of us.
Unfortunately, Zipcar isn’t available in Germany. After I returned home, my account remained inactive for a long time — until yesterday. Looking for a rental in London, I instantly jumped on the idea of Zipcar when my girlfriend told me they were available here. “I wonder if my account still works.” It did.
First, however, I had to reset my password. And that’s when the obstacle race began. I can’t blame Zipcar for not remembering my password, but I can blame them for sending users from app to website and back, slow page loading times, and excessive data requirements — all before giving them what they’re looking for: Where are the cars, and how much do they cost?
After getting the reset email and going to Zipcar’s website, for some reason, I had to enter both my personal information and my new password.
Lesson: Only ask your users for the data you need at each step. Don’t make them enter their address when all you want is confirm their email.
“While I’m on the web app, might as well look at the map here,” I thought. Nope. After the login, I was immediately redirected to this page:
I went to “My Account.” At the top of the page, I was greeted with, “it’s all about me!” As it turned out, quite the opposite was the case. For the next 20 minutes, Zipcar made me jump through all kinds of hoops without giving me anything in return.
You train a dog by asking him to do something and then giving him something as a reward. A treat. A pat on the head. Vocal encouragement. If you just keep dishing out commands, your dog will eventually give up.
We’re not dogs, of course, but when it comes to business-customer interactions, we also expect some form of give-and-take.
First, Zipcar forced me to update my payment data. I didn’t even indicate I wanted to make a booking yet. I mean, you wouldn’t even let me see any prices. Why should I give you my credit card number?
Next, I had to select a membership plan. To do so, I was asked to “Enter the address where you’ll need Zipcars nearby most often.” Okay. I entered my girlfriend’s London address — after all, that’s where we’ll need the car.
Now, I was given one of three choices: basic, smart, and plus. This was the first time I saw any currency signs — unfortunately just in the form of fees and savings — I still had no idea how much renting a zipcar actually cost.
I also don’t appreciate the “£0 limited time only, normally £19 one-off joining fee” ploy. This is a psychological trick to make me feel like Zipcar is going out of its way to enable my free onboarding. Of course, the reality is it costs them $0 to begin with — and so they’re not just making me dance, they’re also dressing me up like a clown.
Don’t take your customers for idiots. They’re not. If you’re using cheap tricks, most of the time, they’ll know.
I select the basic plan anyway and now, the real fun begins: “Enter your driver’s license info.” Except it’s been in there for eight years. German licenses don’t expire — an option you specifically select when you enter your info on Zipcar for the first time.
Most of all why ask for my occupation, again for my phone number, and the country my phone is registered in? Those are of no relevance here, yet are required fields to keep proceeding.
Zipcar still had my info — my driver’s license number showed up correctly — but now they asked me to upload pictures of my license and a selfie of me holding it. At 11:13 PM, I can think of more fun things to repeat in my life.
After this, Zipcar asked for my payment info — which I had just updated 10 minutes earlier — including a billing address, which I set to my German address, as that’s the one connected to my credit card.
Then, the cacophony of swelling disaster this simple account reactivation had been came to its trumpeting crescendo. Here’s the final screen:
“We’ll send you a zipcard.” At no point had the thought crossed my mind that Zipcar still uses cards to unlock vehicles. Scooter apps, NFC, passive entry for cars — and Zipcar wants to send me a card, which’ll take 3–7 business days — and might not be here for the trip I want to take in 10 (!) days.
If your customer can’t go from zero to using your product in the time frame most customers would expect to use that product, they will leave.
It’s hard. We want everything these days, and we want it fast. But rental cars has always been a relatively short-notice business. If you tell people who plan two weeks in advance that they’re too late, that just won’t cut it.
Finally, and this almost made me smile, where best to send my zipcard than my German address, even though I specified in the first step that I’m looking for a zipcar in London? I closed the browser and gave up.
Now, every time I open the phone app, I’m greeted with this cheeky popup:
I agree, Zipcar. Something went wrong. In fact, a lot of things did. At least you provided me with a few valuable lessons:
- Your onboarding needs to be a smooth, seamless experience. Everyone knows that. But so must be your reactivation process. Dormant accounts are less common than new or dead ones, but not so uncommon you can afford to ignore them. If you do, you might lose a customer who once loved you for no reason other than you putting stones in their way.
- Don’t make customers enter the same information twice. Ever.
- Don’t make customers enter irrelevant information just because you want it — and definitely don’t require them to do so.
- Don’t treat your customer like the village idiot as you make them jump through your hoops. Don’t pretend to be generous with cheap, twisted words. Actually be generous — or don’t bother at all.
- If your onboarding or reactivation takes a while, acknowledge it. “We know this is annoying, but it’ll be over soon.” A few simple words showing me Zipcar understands my misery would have gone a long way.
- Don’t show a complete disregard for how you handle your customer’s information. If you ask me for a location with a specific goal in mind, show me you’re capable of actually using that data to help me achieve that goal. Wanting to ship the card to the location where I don’t need the car makes me think you didn’t pay attention.
- Don’t leave the worst for last. Chances are, Zipcar knows exactly why they’re only telling you the card will take 3–7 days in the very last step. They hope you’ll hit “Submit” anyway and resort to using it for another trip other than the short-term one you might have planned. If your onboarding takes too long, fix it. Don’t give me the bad news at the end.
Most of all, never — never — hide the free parts of your product or service behind an information obstacle course.
Whatever data you can equip me with, give it to me, and give it to me right away. Today, every business expects their customers’ details. It’s only fair you give us yours in return.
All Zipcar would have had to do to avoid this train wreck of a user experience is show me the map of available cars, along with prices, instantly. That’s it.
In reliving this painful experience to write about it, I actually did find some of what I wanted to know: On the “Select Plan” screen, after clicking “See more details,” I actually got a breakdown of hourly and daily rates.
I could also see the daily driving limit is 60 miles, and that, therefore, Zipcar isn’t the right option for me anyway. That was a long walk around the block; one I won’t be making again any time soon.
But whatever I’ll drive in, it won’t be a zipcar. They were in my pole position, but they couldn’t get the show on the road.